


Lacking

by tarragonthedragon



Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: BAMF Lucy, Family, Family Dynamics, Gen, POV Edmund Pevensie, Sibling Bonding, Sibling Rivalry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-28
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:40:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22943422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarragonthedragon/pseuds/tarragonthedragon
Summary: Uncharitable again. This, frankly, was why Lucy didn’t usually let him alone for more than a day or so. If he forgot how annoying his siblings were, he started to remember how much more annoying he found everyone else.Edmund would rather either of his siblings were here to talk to her. Unfortunately, unless Eustace's change of heart had made him any good at talking about feelings with fourteen-year-old sisters, Edmund was all Lucy had.
Relationships: Edmund Pevensie & Lucy Pevensie
Comments: 2
Kudos: 61





	Lacking

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KadmeRead](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KadmeRead/gifts).



Edmund had always considered himself more similar to Susan than to Peter or Lucy. This had been the cause of some contention between the two of them– from Susan, who even at seven had liked to think herself much more grown up and sensible than her baby sister or her two brothers, and from Edmund, who hadn’t realised until he was at least twelve that Susan thought herself to be the only one with any brains at all almost as often as he did. It was, perhaps unfairly on either, a relief to both of them when the siblings, in Narnia or in England, found themselves split into older-and-younger, or brothers-and-sisters, since it meant that even if they didn’t happen to be correct on this particular occasion, then at least the other wasn’t there to be correct instead. Peter had been a wise king, and even when they were young again usually explained why he didn’t agree with them. And he was both of their older brother, which always made it sting a little less when he made the decisions. And Lucy, while rather more prone to gleeful I-told-you-so’s than any of her siblings, was eminently tolerable once they had been old enough once over to realise that she wouldn’t have been half as delighted to be right if she didn’t consider them both rather intelligent to begin with. Susan and Edmund left alone together, even well into middle age, were almost guaranteed to solve any problem that relied on wits or cleverness, but only once one or both of them had been in tears. Lucy and Peter, by contrast, had been the best of friends since she was just a baby, climbing his trousers and running to him in tears whenever Edmund, competitive even at five, had knocked his fellow toddler over.

Standing on the prow of the Dawn Treader, looking out at the empty water, Edmund wished Peter were here to talk to Lucy, to say just the right things and make it look like it was easy. Or Susan, who would probably just know somehow what had been bothering her since the Duffers’ island, and he could be angry at her for acting like it was obvious, instead of furious with himself for not knowing. But Lucy wouldn’t be standing here staring at the skyline if it was him who was hurt. Lucy, who always seemed certain of what she was going to do next, even if it wasn’t the cleverest or kindest thing, because it was almost always the best she could do. Lucy was the one who pushed, and let the others hold her back or be dragged along as they wished, because they hadn’t let her push on ahead since they had first come through the wardrobe together.

But it was just Edmund. Or, well, Edmund and Eustace, who was a lot less of an ass but still as much of a know-it-all as ever, and who was perched on a beam with Reepicheep again anyway. It would be like talking to Susan, except if Susan really was as stupid as he sometimes acted like she was in uncharitable moments.

This was probably an uncharitable moment. It would be even more uncharitable to assume that Peter and Susan and Lucy didn’t have those. Even if it did always seem unfairly easy for them to be kind, and nice, and good. Edmund only ever seemed to have a decent handle on good.

“You’re moping,” Eustace said, from right next to him. Edmund did not jump.

“I’m watching the horizon,” he replied, which had the benefit of being factually true if not much else.

“Is it because of whatever’s bothering Lucy?” Eustace asked. Clearly he had learnt a little more about being a decent chap, though Edmund rather sourly considered that if he had learnt any more he might not have come over to bother him.

Uncharitable again. This, frankly, was why Lucy didn’t usually let him alone for more than a day or so. If he forgot how annoying his siblings were, he started to remember how much more annoying he found everyone else.

“That’s a yes, then,” Eustace carried on. The area around them was suspiciously free of sailors, because Reepicheep was a little traitor. “Well, it’s not like I know anything about younger sisters–”

“No, you don’t.”

“But when I was brooding, you sent Reepicheep to hit me with a sword, and if you don’t talk to her I’m going to just assume the same tactic will work again.”

“You can’t–” Edmund broke off, scowling at Eustace’s gleefully smug face. “The difference is, I actually like Lucy when she’s herself.”

“I probably deserve that,” Eustace admitted. “But I promised Caspian I wouldn’t be an ass if he let me do this talk, so really I should be commended for the work I’m putting in.”

If Peter had said that, Edmund would have been certain it was a joke. With this new, rather less annoying and slightly less incompetent version of his cousin, it was very much a guess either way. He was spared having to respond by a shout of land, and rushed to his station.

Of course, because this was a magical voyage in Narnia, the shout of land led them to a lost lord and an island of thick mist and even before they saw anything Edmund could hear her, hear it, hear his nightmares looming down on them.

He was not much good at comforting his siblings. He was becoming worryingly good at resisting the call of the White Witch.

Lucy, because of course, was already making quick work of the horrors coming down upon them whilst he was transfixed. Lucy, who got angry instead of scared, leaped down to the deck in front of her brother with a kind of barely-human snarl the second Jadis was vanished, arrows flying and dagger flashing, not missing a step when he reclaimed himself enough to join the battle. And of course the sea serpent didn’t scare her, or if it did it didn’t stop her firing an arrow clean into the creature’s head.

He had never had a head for archery. Fighting was a lot easier, in Edmund’s book, when you had a sword and ‘at something’ was a good enough direction to swing it in a pinch. Clearly Eustace agreed with him, since he had managed to break one on scales like stone. Maybe it was a particular madness of the Pevensie sisters, because Susan didn’t get scared either, always channelling it into doing something useful.

Lucy sat down next to him behind a lashed-together row of barrels. “You’re thinking too much.”

“You don’t think enough,” he said, on fourteen-to-fifty years of fraternal instinct more than conscious thought.

“Well one of us has to be impulsive. You’d never get anything done if we sat around waiting for you three to decide what to do next.”

“Usually, we’re sitting around arguing about whose turn it is to hold onto you by the collar, actually.”

She huffed indignantly through her nose. “It’s not like I’m ever leading you wrong. I remember quite a lot of I-told-you-sos, when we were here the first time. And the second time, for that matter.”

“Not this time?”

“This time, we’ve got Eustace instead of Peter and Susan. There’s no fun in it with you two, you just mope and he ignores me.”

“I don’t mope,” he protested, biting back the urge to cry hypocrisy. “I ponder.”

“Maybe when you were a grown-up you’re pondered. You’re a teenager again, and you’ve been moping an awful lot.”

Edmund laughed. “He’s getting a lot better,” he said, making the most of the lack of uncharitable urges while it lasted. This turned out to be only a few seconds. “Aunt Alberta will be furious.”

Lucy hummed in agreement, and then paused, flopping over onto him. “I still wish we had them instead. I was just thinking, before– before the island. I was thinking that Peter would know exactly how to handle Eustace. And how to talk to him now that he’s not such a terror. And Eustace would probably listen to him.”

“People do,” he agreed. For a moment they made equally crinkled-nose expressions of frustration in silence, both thinking of being a king and queen grown. “I was thinking that if Susan were here, she’d have an answer for everything.”

Lucy went quiet. “I’ve been having rather uncharitable thoughts about Susan lately,” she admitted after some time.

Edmund bit back his initial response, which would not have been helpful. Lucy didn’t sound like she expected him to have much of a good response, but it wasn’t like anyone else on the ship would have a better one. “Would it shock you at all to know that I have uncharitable thoughts about Susan almost every time I talk to her? Sometimes even just hearing Caspian mention her is enough to set me off.”

“Edmund!”

“Just yesterday we went past a rock that looked a bit like her and I thought, she’d be awfully smug if I told her I thought that.”

“I saw that rock!” Lucy exclaimed before she could catch herself, and then bit down on her grin. “And anyway, I don’t mean..”

When it seemed like she wasn’t going to find the right words, Edmund sighed. “I always rather imagine that Susan has as many uncharitable thoughts about me as I do about her. It’s the ones about Peter I feel guilty about.”

“He can be quite annoying when he thinks he’s right.”

“He always thinks he’s right. And in charge. Somehow it’s less irritating when you do it.”

“I do not!” She pushed herself off his shoulder, glaring. “You always think you’re right, too!”

“So does Susan,” he commented. “And Eustace. Clearly there’s an awful lot of pride in the blood on that side.”

“Maybe that’s what’s needed in Narnia. Noone here seems to think like that.”

“It can’t be too bad, then, can it?”

Lucy bit her lip again, looking all of nine. “Or we’re supposed to learn better.”

“We did learn better,” he pointed out. “At least, I did. Eustace has. And you grew up an awful lot, the first time.”

“We all did. But then…”

There was nothing to be said for being young again, but at least she looked pensive rather than upset.

“Come on,” Edmund said, pulling himself up. “I’m going to borrow you a sword. Eustace doesn’t look nearly as scared of you as he should be, after that shot. We’ll have a spar on the starboard deck.”

Lucy grinned, thwacking his arm as he pulled her after him, but didn’t argue.

**Author's Note:**

> For @kadmeread in the Narnia winter gift exchange 2020. On tumblr [here](https://narniagiftexchange.tumblr.com/post/190589841582/the-winter)!


End file.
